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How we can help

Visiting us in person

If you attend one of our offices and are not homeless or threatened with homelessness, or we cannot see you at that time, we may arrange for you to return for a scheduled appointment to discuss your circumstances in more detail.

If you do come to the offices for advice, please bring any relevant information with you, such as your tenancy agreement, notice to quit from your landlord, any letters threatening repossession from mortgage lenders or any court orders that you may have. Please be advised that the service can be very busy over lunchtimes.

Preventing your homelessness

We will try to prevent you becoming homeless if possible and may be able to negotiate extra time for you so you can find somewhere else to live. If we can't help you to remain where you are, or you have nowhere to stay, then we will look to help you with a variety of other housing options. This could be help in accessing private rented accommodation, a move to supported accommodation or help in getting priority on the Devon Home Choice housing register.

Emergency accommodation

If you are homeless we may provide temporary accommodation for you and your household until you are able find alternative accommodation. This could be bed and breakfast accommodation, or it could be supported housing reserved for use by homeless families. The type depends on demand at the time of homelessness and where there is a vacancy.

Temporary accommodation is generally only provided for emergency cases where the applicant is in priority need. Temporary accommodation is not guaranteed to be in your area of choice.

If we do provide temporary accommodation, an investigation will be carried out into the reasons for your homelessness. If we determine that you lost your previous home through your own fault, you could be found to be intentionally homeless. This means we will not have a duty to provide you with long term accommodation, but you may be given a period of time (usually 28 days) allowing you to find somewhere else to live. We may have a duty to inform Social Services if you have dependant children and are intentionally homeless.